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SOMETHING is just not stacking up in the story of rescued backpacker Sam Woodhead.

The Sunday Mail this week returned to Upshot Station and with the assistance of expert local tracker Stephen Parker, retraced the footsteps of the 18-year-old Brit who went missing from the cattle property 114km south-west of Longreach.

The trek has raised more questions than answers - issues puzzling locals since he was found after three days lost in the harsh scrub in 40C temperatures.

By Mr Woodhead's own account of what happened while he was missing - visiting a car dump on the property, climbing a hill and crossing a fence - at times he was barely out of sight of the homestead.

Facts in the backpacker's story have left Mr Parker and fellow searchers perplexed.

Mr Parker, the third generation owner of neighbouring Strathfinella Station and an expert tracker, was among the 50-strong search party of locals who dropped tools and used their own aircraft, motorbikes, horses and feet to find the backpacker.

It was Mr Parker who found the first sign of Mr Woodhead, a footprint 3km southeast from the homestead. But now Mr Parker and many others are questioning Sam's story, unsure why the teen had a bag of clothes and contact lens fluid when he left his usual jogging track - the station's 1.3km airstrip.

sam woodhead tracker exposeSource:The Sunday Mail (Qld)

"People said we didn't find him (initially) because we weren't trained. But we muster cattle ... and it's just something you have to learn straight up, how to track. We know what to do," Mr Parker said.

After realising he was lost on Tuesday afternoon, Mr Woodhead told police he came across a car dump, making him think he was on the neighbouring property.

But the car dump is barely 800m from the Upshot Station homestead, a part of the property where Mr Woodhead had previously visited and worked twice before with owner Tanya Dawson.

"I don't know how he didn't see the house even at night, I had it lit up," she said.

Mr Woodhead told the UK paper Mail on Sunday in a paid exclusive that after running about 6km and using up his water, he climbed a hill to try to see where the homestead was after about 90 minutes. He said he couldn't see anything but trees.

But when The Sunday Mail and Mr Parker climbed the same hill this week, it afforded a 360-degree panorama of the station and in the distance, a view of the homestead.

From there, it appears Mr Woodhead made the mistake of crossing a fence. Just days earlier, Mr Woodhead had worked on the same 1.85m-high fence.

Mr Woodhead was found by the EMQ helicopter on Friday about 4pm - 5km from the Upshot homestead and 1.5km into the neighbouring Spring Hill property.

The Sunday Mail made repeated requests to interview Mr Woodhead about his days lost in the scrub.

He is still in Australia, but calls and text messages made yesterday were not returned.